See ya

I'm glad that Thursday is over!  Of course yours has been over for hours now and mine is not quite but close enough!

Seems like this was one of those days where nothing went particularly well.  The piggy's sickness started it and she seems to be feeling better so that's good.  Otie is limping around pretty good tonight with his tail down.  So they are taking turns. I'm hoping Wagsworth will give them both a boost of energy

I'm going to play it by ear on Wagsworth, I may bring them first thing in AM or may come home a little earlier than I planned and do it in the PM. There's supposed to be a sprinkling of snow tonight.  Then 1-3" on Saturday.  It is all supposed to melt Saturday night and be in the high 40s on Sunday and Monday.

I didn't have any luck with the camera tonight either.  It seems to have mysteriously made today's pictures disappear.

As fot the rest of the day, I came home early and fed the kids dinner.  Finally finishing the pasta.  Amelia also finished off the celery.  I'll add that to the Wegman's list. That reminds me that yesterday we got the other kind of Star Wars yogurt which has a Watermelon burst and a strawberry banana.  They both seem to like them.  Amelia has been into the Caramel (Dulce de Leche) Cheerios and Jeremy with his PB ones.

We left at 6 PM and I thought I'd have plenty o' time to get M&M's for Denise.  Well Route 100 had an accident so it was closed both ways between Fairview and Prizer.  So, we had to wind around back there with the rest of the world.

I heard Tom talking about how he got his woman a diamond, but they are not engaged.  Denise ridiculed us for going to WDW and that was about all I learned there.  We now have our next 2 appointments made also.

Work has been pretty hectic, too, with weird stuff.  Today I had to call the Uwchlan Twp police because someone wanted to serve papers on one of our employees and wouldn't leave.

So, I know tomorrow will be a better day. :)  We packed up tonight and I have a list of things to do.  I ran the d/w last night and emptied it.  I got the trash out and they collected all the boxes we had (due to the new shelves in the living room).  I checked in for our flight and we are A37-A39.  So that is good.  I brought some more paper home since we apparently were out of that.  I just got finished cleaning up the house since I won't get much more of an opportunity before the Cleaners come Monday morning.  I was actually surprised about what good shape it was in!  I cur fingernails, too, without too much drama.  So, there.  Those are the things I accomplished and did well.  I will focus on them for now.

Here's the one picture I have because I just took it.  Proof the bags are packed.  Two carryons for me.  Tinies will have their backpacks.

Tomorow I'll be home in the afternoon some time and we'll park directly at the airport.  That reminds me that I got an e-mail from Winner saying they lowered their prices, which were already pretty good.  So that's something for next time.

I hope you are enjoying your last few days there, get a chance to rest up and relax before coming home.  Today was a pretty ragged day.  We'll all be glad to have the Pean home!  We love, love, love you and miss, miss, miss you!!

January 18

Today was nota  good photo day.  Didn't get a lot and those I got were some pretty ugly ones.  I'm blaming the weather for that even if it makes no sense.  Anyway, here are the kiddos before school showing off their paper chains.

 COld and windy at the bus stop.  Then a rather uneventful day at school.  I have been talking to them almost everyday when they get home.  Today was do nothing day.  They were supposed to go to Tae Kwon Do, but they realized that I had the sparring gear.  Oh well.  I was in a meeting all afternoon so even though they called early enough that I could have gotten it to them, it was too late.  My first truly sweetlish moment.  I had thought if it a couple days ago and then forgot.  I was just glad I remembered it was trash night tonight. :)

When I got home, they said they wanted to eat at Ron's unprovoked.  So, who am I to disagree?  Back to Ron's we go.  I had an oval.  JEremy had his burgler and Amelia had her pizza.  It was only about a 3 minute wait.  Here they are working on their owl colorings.

  

When I got home Amelia showed me her new rainbow fairy book.  It is approximately 31820398X better than the novels she has been bringing home.  It is a reasonable size with big words and colored pictures.  She told me that this one came from the classroom though and not the library.

I see they are still looking for $ for the Silent Auction.  Not sure if they counted the check I sent for both A&J or not.  Also not sure why they spent $230 on AG and $71 on legos, but what do I know.  I saw the list of sponsors for the Silent Auction and it's very, very long.

On our way back from Ron's I picked up milk and got gas.  A&J both got swedish fish.  They ate 6 of them and then played with 1 of them for a while.  Amelia was dressed in her Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique hair accessories today, too.

When we got home, we did some clothes picking and a little packing for WDW.  I also got out the cleaning supplies and cleaning $ because I really don't want to have to remember that later.  We will need more crappy paper towels which I put on the list on Our Groceries.  I started typing "crap" and it immediately gave it to me as a choice, which amused me.

Well, I hope you get a chance to get some WiFi again before you get home to read this.  Did they have it on the plane or not?  All international flights should have it.

Anyway...enjoy your last few days and we'll see you soon.  We love you and miss you!!!!!!!

Day after MLK Day

Yay!  We got to skype again.  Only minor problems, but nice.  The tinies and I were thrilled.  I think mommy heard most of the highlights, but I'll run through some of the stuff.  Not many pictures today.

Last night when ew went to bed it was sleeting so hard the tinies asked a million questions.  By this afternoon it was 55 degrees.  Once again, weird weather.  Tomorrow the high is 40 which was the low today.  So, the beach certainly sounds nicer!

School was a good day.  They had borrowed books last week from the classroom and we returned them.  Much nicer books than the fairy ones!

I ran the dishwasher, too.  Without incident.

In work related news my boss was in the office today for the second time in 2012.  That added some stress.  It's just been crazy at work.  Proxy hasn't even really heated up.  But this is a story for another day.

Dancing in PJs was fun.  As I said, we had cheesebread.  The tinies eat the pasta practically every night we're home.  They love it.  So that makes that easy.  No one napped today,  but there wasn't too much crankiness like I thought there might be after MLKrayola day.  So that was good.  I updated their leapstes tonight which thrilled them.  Jeremy has also really been into his race car and has kept track of how many times his Star Wars speeders (which he is now using exclusively) are jumping over the track and landed correctly.  He has reach 100!  Amelia has been playing with her Cinderella Castle all week.

I finished (almost completely) straightening the Living Room, so here's a preview for you.  Lots of space for Jeremy's legos.

We also keep adding to the Chain:



After our skype call, I had a call with my friends in China.  Didn't start until 9:30 PM so, the tinies were sleeping away and haven't heard a peep.  So, that's good.

Tomorrow may be Tae Kwon Do.  It certainly will be trash day.  Gotta keep that n mind. I'll send you info for our trip via e-mail.  Have a great rest of the time in Thailand and we'll try to keep you updated.  We miss and love you!

MLK-rayola Day

Hwo do you like my punny title?  Anyway...we were up at our usual school time today so we could go to the Crayola factory.  It was another freezing one!  Before leaving, Amelia wanted to show off the iPod that her Lego Friends person (Stephanie) and dog (Ruffsley) have.  They have some cool little accessories.

Jeremy is working on his 15th police lego item.

I got the water bottles, packed up the dogs and off we went at 8:12 AM.  It took 1 hr 16 minutes to get there.  That ride STINKS!  I despise Route 100.  Depressing and awful especially with no one there to ridicule it with me!

Anyway we got to Easton.  You follow the animal footprints to the Factory from the parking garage.  The garage was essentially empty.  There were only about 8 people at the Factory - I should say "Experience" it appears to have changed it's name last year.  I guess because it is not really a Factory.  Plus they opened a new store.  But I digress (and it's not even an interesting one)

Proof we arrived!

THey had a couple of crayon scultptures.  Here is the "Izey" tower as Jeremy called it.

You get three tokens.  You turn those tokes in for a free marker, free box of crayons (4) and free pack of model magic clay.  Then there are little exhibits and projects to do.  Here is the "color explosion" demo.  Back paper you color and it shows multicolors underneath it.

There are things that are fun to draw on - like this car.

Here we are in front of the factory demo that they run once an hour.  They make a crayon and a marker. My man knew lots of stuff from his Kindergarten book already.  Most of the machinery is from the 40s and 60s so it's not the stuff they use today but interesting.  Then you get a freshly-made crayon and marker.  The crayon was still warm.  Red was the color of the day.

This is a running count of crayons made since 1903 when Binney and Smith was founded.

They seem to have a theme each month.  The theme this month is traveling on vacation.  So first we made a suitcase (for some reason I didn't take a picture of that, but one is below) and then a passport.  The passport was made with washable paint and stamps.  Then you put it in a dryer.

This was a cool thing where you dance to the music and it creates colors on the wall.  Here's what our crazy kids looked like:

Here's what the wall looked like:

By now the place was filling up.  A big MLK day activity.  Lots more dads than I expected.  But EVERYONE was from New York and North Jersey.  I mean everyone.  I saw 4712837 Giants' jerseys and hard quite a few great accents.

I made this elephant for the peanit as a reminder of Thailand out of Crayola model magic.

We made sand art, too.  Amelia made a heart and jeremy a seashell.  I always wanted to do sand art but resisted the urge. I think I was denied as a child. :)

There was a giant chalkboard floor to draw on, too.  And slip on.  It was treacherous.  Someone needs to notify crayola's lawyers.

The last exhibit was about the Easton canal system (don't ask why).

There was a decent sized Crayola store next door.  It's funny to see all the Crayola stuff in one place and shirts, etc.  I did not find the flash light that Grum and Pop had, but I looked.   The store was only completed after the January shut down (which ended like January 11th), so it was brand spanking new.

The highlight is the world's largest crayon.  Blue

On the way home we stopped at the only eatery that was nearby (other than 2384 McDonald's) and that was a Wendy's.  I got a free frosty, though.  There must have been 15 people in line, but everyone was quite hungry so we waited.

We were home around 2:20.  Here is a picture of our haul.  Including the suticases A&J made.  Ready for another trip, pean?

So then we just rested up.  We left for O&O's at 4:45.  Dinner was a at 5:30.  We had veal stew (like the William Penne Pasta that Liberty Tree Tavern used to serve but with Veal).  The kids had noodles.  Jeremy just had cheese on his.  Amelia had sauce of course.  In a shocking development, they had a coconut custard pie from Shady Maple and 3 donuts for dessert.  I opted for the donut.  The kids shared one, too.  A vanilla long john which I don't think I am familiar with.

We headed home.  That's when I got Mommy's email.  Yay wifi again!  The beach shot looked gorgeous and awesome.  I hope this gives you the chance to relax that you deserve (both on this trip and otherwise).  I'll be back at work tomorrow.  I actually have a call with my friends in China at 9:30 PM tomorrow.  So, once again, I'll be closer than you think!

I leave you with this shot.  Your Otis was all wound up today.  We played a great game of growling crabby.  Not bad for a ten year old Doggie with a limp.

We miss you and love you.

We started out the day by finishing up our lego projects from yesterday.  IT was so cold that A&J both wanted to wear fleeces today so here they are.  Jeremy is also sporting new jeans from Target.  He has gotten holes in two pairs of his existing jeans since mommy left.

Then we headed off to church.  The kids had a good time.  It was a mob scene.  I was surprised given the cold. I was more surprised to find that it had really snowed in Rofo and Spring City.  A nice litle coating.  We had nothing.

It was off to PF Changs for dinner but not before stopping in Wegman's to get a chocolate chip muffin, roll and some cheese for a quick trip.  We were there around 11:45.  It was empty when we got there but really filled up.  We managed to polish off the green beans without mommy.  Everyone had their usual stuff.  Amelia's fortune cookie was empty!  This could have been a trauma but I told her that was extra lucky and she could make up her own fortune.  You'll be happy to know that she is going to be a princess when she grows up.

 

Service was a little slow, so Jeremy had time to build quite the Masterpiece.

After PFC we went to Costco and picked up water, bounty and turbo tax.  We went to the Limerick Costco.  Then it was off to Braxton's where we got some food for the dogs.  THey only had small bags of Sophie's food though.

When we got home it was about 2:45.  We skipped naps.  Amelia drew this nice picture.

Later we worked on our chains.  Here they are with 7 links!

After that it was more legos and toys for the kids.  I'm still working on my own masterpiece.  Remaking the living room.  You won't recognize it when you get home.

Now I'm watching the Golden Globes.  And I fileld you in on the Nain's news/  Tomorrow it is off to Crayloa.  It opens at 9:30 and takes 65 minutes to get there.

We miss mommy very much and love her!!!!!!!!!

Saturday

Today was a real busy one, that's for sure.  But, most of the day (thanks to WiFi!) you were able to follow along.

As previously mentioned, I woke up wide awake at 5:30 AM and laid in bed for about an hour or 90 minutes and apparently fell back to sleep because I didn't wake up again until 8:30!  Didn't think I'd need the alarm today to make it to Tae Kwon Do at 10!  

Nevertheless, we did get dressed, eat and make it with plenty of time to spare.  Amelia had "dulce de leche" cheerios and loved them.  Jeremy stuck with PB.

We left at 9:23 and arrived at 9:48 for TKD.  Before the doors were open.  I think I told you all the interesting stuff from Class.  Larry was kind of a boring teacher, but MR. Larkin was hilarious and A&J loved being called "the experts" since everyone else working with them was new.

After TKD, we got changed (putting on jeans in the car) and went to Corroploese.  That was not the plan, but it won out by popular demand.  I got a roast pork sandwich and A&J had tomato pie while we drove to Oaks to see Beauty & the Beast (and Tangled Ever After) which began at 12:35.  Brrrrr...it was a cold one today.  Only got up to 34.  Tomorrow's high is supposed to be 28!

We all enjoyed the movie.  A&J wanted candy not popcorn.  Amelia susprisingly picked Nerds and loved them.  Jeremy picked sour patch kids.  I had some sno caps for the first time in about 10 years.   The movie was remarkably empty.  Not sure that is a great sign.

We drove home through horrible traffic in Phoenixville (what's new?)  Then I spent some time straightening out and reconfiguring the living room.  Made a bunch of progress while A&J alternately played and fought.  Today was much more bickering than the previous days.  Maybe too much sleep last night.

For dinner, I cooked up the frozen pizza for them and I had some Tomato Pie.  Then it was off to Toys R Us to replace the toy Aunt Dangerous got Jeremy. Amelia also produced two copies of the same Tangled book.  I had already told her she could get a small "friends" lego so I told her we'd replace Santa's error on the book, too.  She chose a Barbie Mermaid.  So all in all we got 4 lego sets (buy one get one 50% off) and a barbie mermaid for a grand total of $22.  Not too shabby.  HEre's the loot (you will also see the pig heading off for her 234th drink, apparently these pills make her thirsty):

We also went to Target.  I got hair goop, peptos some organizer stuff for the living room.  When we got back, I assembled that while A&J worked on their legos.  Jeremy built both of his smaller ones and Amelia is about 80% done with hers.  She is so proud of herself and happy that she is doing it all by herself "My first lego!"  Every step she is done, she has to tell me about. :)  So, we got to bed pretty late, but it was worth it.  A full, fun day.

I also cleaned the pig's ears out because she was shaking her head (though she is still eating like a horse). I got a lot of blood and gunk out.  So, I am going to keep doing that and putting the Animax in.

Amber is probably glad she did not have to watch this Denver Broncos debacle.  Soon I am heading up the wooden hill to read my book and go to bed.  

I saw leif commenting on Chiang Mai - the world traveler is impressed.  We hope mommy had a safe flight.  Amelia really "hopes" that Mommy got a picture of the Rapunzel lantern, so if you see another one, get out that iPhone!  We miss you and love you!  Enjoy Hua Hin.

Chain

Part deux.

Tomorrow will be a two-link day, since skype had us thrown off.  We had been doing that before bed.  I had to go up and tell A&J that we forgot to do it, since I am sure it would occur to one or both of them at 3 AM and then they would have to come tell me. :)

Today was Skypeday (Friday for us, Saturday for Mommy)

We got off to another good start today.  I think I was sleeping when my alarm went off for the first time all week, so must finally be more tired.  OF course, I was up watching UVA barely lose to Duke, then reading and then e-mailing with the Peanit.  So, a busy night last night.

This morning it was very windy after sleeting and raining at night.  When we got downstairs a snow squall moved in!

Amelia had the Melon Burst squeezable yogurt that comes with the Cotton Candy light sabre one.  She was thrilled the the light sabre was pink and the yogurt tasted like watermelon!  She was just thrilled and could not believe it was not summer.  JEremy had some more PB cheerios.  He only wanted to eat 10 but I gave him a handful.  He is still very stuffy in the morning, but not much coughing.

The dogs love PB cheerios, too.  HEre's a pic of the pig with her slightly bigger waste.  Tomorrow she will take her last pain pills.  Hope that she's getting better.  I have noticed she is more chipper before I get her pills.  I did have to clean up a couple spots on the rug this morning, though.  She and Otie and drinking up a storm.

Here's the almost 10 year old.

Then we went to the 'pute and looked at the pictures.  Amelia loved the pink (and purple) cars!

Jeremy thought the star wars people looked like Kennett.  Kind of anime I guess.

I followed this truck to work.  The back says "metz"  That reminds me yesterday I saw a hot air balloon going up.  It must have been very cold.  AMelia thinks they must have worn two pairs of mittens and "ear mugs"  I informed here while I think ear mugs sound cool, they probably wouldn't keep your ears warm (unless full of coffee, I guess)

My mom said the day went well.  Amelia did not open her door.  No one appears to have actually slept, but they did behave.  Not much has come home from school.  They worked with buddies today on a a MLK Day project.  But couldn't remember what it was.  My mom has made it through 4 chapters in the Fairy book and agrees the books stink.

I spent must of my day talking to people in China today, so it actually made me feel a little closer to the Pean.

We went to Isaac's for dinner.  It was both of their choice so that's good.  Extreme PB Mallows and ice cream sundaes.  Jeremy is showing off his pretzel goldfish on a stick.

We stopped at Wawa for milk and gas and headed home to get ready for Skype.  As I said, A was devastated but playing Scene it made her feel better (winning made her feel better).  We had just finished when we heard that Mommy could get on through Prisana's account and I sensed she might be getting teary eyed again, so that was great!

I'm glad Mommy went ziplining and saw monkeys.  I'm jealous of the elephant ride, even if Amelia thinks it would be slimy.  We hope you have a sooper dooper day.  Tomorrow will be TKD and perhaps Beauty and the Beast.  Not quite sure.  It's gonna be cold and windy.  33 tomorrow and 29 on Sunday!   Send some warmth our way.

Your whole family loves and misses you!